- I was LoveSpreader of the week 7th to 13th of July 2013 - I asked if there was a way to remove the support badge because I didn't like how it impacted on my avatar. So this is a new option since then.- I am an active member of the Film Lovers Guild here on BGG.- Since December 2013 I am proud collaborator at The Creativity Hub

I started playing boardgames when I was a kid, so that was about 26 or 27 years ago. I was born in Germany although both my parents are Portuguese. As you migh imagine, boardgames where all around. Although personally I started buying them pretty late, about 15 years later. By then, I was already living in Portugal and it wasn't very easy to get my hands on new boardgames, so it was a long walk till I got to the modest collections I own now. There's almost no game I don't really like. Some of those that I enjoy less have been given to me as gifts or as sweeteners in some of the trades I did on BGG.

Other hobbies of mine are literature, music, cinema and photography. A few years ago I started doing films with some friends of mine. We did 3 short-films that garnered some award: the first two were awarded "best film" in their respective short-film festival, the third one won the award for "best sound-track". You can check 'em out right here (one has an error on the subtitles and the other has no subtitles). In the meantime I did a few more films after a long struggle in putting my own equipment together and I hope this will pick up more now. You can watch my films (in which I had different levels of involvement) from most recent to oldest:

Film made for the 100 hour film race 2014. Many imperfections but some lessons learned. Great experience. Also, my avatar provided some of the inspiration that drove this film:

I made this video for a local Belfast performance artist. I used an unfamiliar camera so there are a few glitches in it and also the greenscreen bit is far from perfect. Still, quite happy with the end-result:

Film made for Trench board game. The absolutely fantastic music was composed by the super-talented Alexandra Andersson, check out some more of her music here: https://soundcloud.com/skvir:

Award for best animated film:

Award for best music:WARNING! This film is a bit of a shocker since it's based on "The Exorcist"

Award for best film in competition

Hopefully a long-running project of mine will be providing videos for this French travelling blog in collaboration with its author:

As of 16th of March of 2013, I have a new avatar. The avatar is a picture of this painting:

This was painted by Alexandra, the same person who composed the music for the Trench film I worked on and is also the first painting I ever bought. There is actually a secret behind this painting and unknown to its author, which is related to the film we are currently shooting and in which that same Alexandra will be the main character. Maybe someday I can disclose that secret, but for now... that's what it is, a secret...

My Top 10 are my favourite games in my collection, they may change as I play and rediscover strategies and gaming mechanics. What I enjoy most about games is their overall concept. I really enjoy a good looking game with good components and a well implemented game mechanic. I'm always fascinated by new games and original mechanics.

My Hot 10 are the games I'm either playing most regularly at the moment or those I'm really eager to play more often.

I have revised my scoring system, I think I have been over-enthusiastic about the way I score games. This is what the numbers mean to me:

Some of you already know it, some of you don't. Consider yourself lucky if you belong to the latter group of users. The Ominous Voice from Below is usually extremely rude and inconvenient. There's no telling when it decides to manifest itself. It made its first appearance on BBG here and it just lost control ever since. It has been dormant for quite some time now, but I fear it just might come back at any time.